LITERARY NOTICES. 



633 



here that the forcible, pointed, and pictu- 

 resque writer is of invaluable service, and 

 it is here that Canon Kingsley excels. The 

 contents of the volume are varied and sug- 

 gestive, and it abounds in passages of point- 

 ed common-sense, like the following fresh 

 plea for the practical study of botany by 

 girls, as grounds of important mental dis- 

 cipline : 



" Mothers complain to me that girls are 

 apt to be — not intentionally untruthful — 

 but exaggerative, prejudiced, incorrect, in 

 repeating a conversation or describing an 

 event ; and that from this fault arise, as is 

 to be expected, misunderstandings, quarrels, 

 rumors, slanders, scandals, and what not. 



" Now, for this waste of words there is 

 but one cure : and if I be told that it is a 

 natural fault of women; that they cannot 

 take the calm, judicial view of matters which 

 men boast, and often boast most wrongly, 

 that they can take ; that under the influence 

 of hope, fear, delicate antipathy, honest 

 moral indignation, they will let their eyes 

 and ears be governed by their feelings ; and 

 see and hear only what they wish to see 

 and hear: I answer, that it is not for me as 

 a man to start such a theory ; but that, if 

 it be true, it is an additional argument for 

 some education which will correct this sup- 

 posed natural defect. And I say deliber- 

 ately that there is but one sort of education 

 which will correct it ; one which will teach 

 young women to observe facts accurately, 

 judge them calmly, and describe them care- 

 fully, without adding or distorting : and 

 that is, some training in natural science. 



" I beg you not to be startled : but if 

 you are, then test the truth of my theory 

 by playing to-night at the game called ' Rus- 

 sian Scandal ; ' in which a story, repeated in 

 secret by one player to the other, comes out 

 at the end of the game, owing to the inac- 

 curate and — forgive me if I say it — unedu- 

 cated brains through which it has passed, 

 utterly unlike its original; not only ludi- 

 crously maimed and distorted, but often 

 with the most fantastic additions of events, 

 details, names, dates, places, which each 

 player will aver that he received from the 

 player before him. I am afraid that too 

 much of the average gossip of every city, 

 town, and village is little more than a game 

 of ' Russian Scandal ; ' with this difference, 



that, while one is but a game, the other is 

 but too mischievous earnest. 



"But now, if among your party there 

 should be an average lawyer, medical man, 

 or man of science, you will find that he, 

 •and perhaps he alone, will be able to retail 

 accurately the story which had been told 

 him. And why ? Simply because his mind 

 has been trained to deal with facts ; to as- 

 certain exactly what he does see or hear, 

 and to imprint its leading features strongly 

 and clearly on his memory. 



*' Now, you certainly cannot make young 

 ladies barristers or attorneys ; nor employ 

 their brains in getting up cases, civil or 

 criminal; and as for chemistry, they and 

 their parents may have a reasonable antip- 

 athy to smells, blackened fingers, and oc- 

 casional explosions and poisonings. But 

 you may make them something of botanists, 

 zoologists, geologists. 



" I could say much on this point : allow 

 me at least to say this : I verily believe that 

 any young lady who would employ some of 

 her leisure time in collectii;g wild-flowers, 

 carefully examining them, verifying them, 

 and arranging them ; or who would in her 

 summer trip to the sea-coast do the same 

 by the common objects of the shore, instead 

 of wasting her holiday, as one sees hun- 

 dreds doing, in lounging on benches on the 

 esplanade, reading worthless novels, and 

 criticising dresses — that such a young lady, 

 I say, would not only open her own mind to 

 a world of wonder, beauty, and wisdom, 

 which, if it did not make her a more rever- 

 ent and pious soul, she cannot be the woman 

 which I take for granted she is ; but would 

 save herself from the habit — I had almost 

 said the necessity — of gossip : because she 

 would have things to think of and not 

 merely persons ; facts instead of fancies ; 

 while she would acquire something of accu- 

 racy, of patience, of methodical observation 

 and judgment, which would stand her in 

 good stead in the events of daily life, and 

 increase her power of bridling her tongue 

 and her imagination. *God is in heaven, 

 and thou upon earth ; therefore let thy words 

 be few ; ' is the lesson which those are learn- 

 ing all day long who study the works of 

 God with reverent accuracy, lest by misrep- 

 resenting them they should be tempted to 

 say that God has done that which he has 



